Since I'm up and <lj-user=teh_fawx>'s still a'dozin (which seems to dismay Hecate!), I was able to catch up on my flist, yay!

Still haven't figured out Trillian Astra all the way.

<lj user=teh_fawx> and I would be the WORST ZOMBIES EVAR. We made our almond do fu brain. One package was the perfect amount to fill my brain-shaped mold! Let it cool, flipped it onto a plate... <i>perfect</i>. A lovely hemisphere of jiggily translucent white. I sprinkled on some cardamom and a drizzle of rose syrup to enhance the flavor, and...

...neither of us managed more than a few bites. I thought it tasted pretty good, but neither of us liked the texture. Of course, do fu isn't meant to be served as a big-ass brain, so I'd put it down to an operator error. It would be much better with pudding.

<a href="http://www.metafilter.com/88786/RIP-Kage-Baker">Kage Baker has passed away.</a>

I've loved her books since I was idly checking out the new books section at the library, stumbled across <i>Sky Coyote</i> and was ensnared by the first sentence:

<blockquote><i>You'll understand this story better if I tell you a lie.</i></blockquote>

Sucked in irrevokably, and joyfully. I read <i>In the Garden of Iden</i> next, missing nothing from having read them out of order, and devoured each new one as it was released. When I first started dating Dan, I hooked him as well, and when we spent a weekend in New Orleans a few weeks later we made a bet: If I went the weekend without being carded for booze, he'd buy the about-to-be-released <i>The Graveyard Game</i>, and if I were to be carded, I would be the purchaser. I did, in fact, get carded on the last day of the trip, and the poor woman selling it to me was baffled by my laughter. Dan and I enjoyed her works together; it was always a delight when one of her stories was in Asimov's and we would curl up on the couch together, listening to his audio-for-the-blind editions.

I went to a writer's workshop at an Armadillocon once, where she was speaking. Didn't have the nerve to approach her, of course, but she had a pleasant manner.

<lj-user=rehd_fawx> is just beginning to be drawn into her works, and I am so very glad to have learned this now, in her company. As it turned out, we were inadvertantlly toasting her this afternoon when we savored mugs of spectacularly rich cocoa, and with deliberation now with sake, Dagoba Xocoatl, and mint chocolate shisha.

I am so glad not to have been alone when I learned this, and even moreso with someone who is becoming as potentially besotted as I am.

Rest well, Ms. Baker. Your words have marked me for life.